Posted on 04/24/2002 8:51:24 PM PDT by knak
I expected brilliance, but what I got was a barely functional career bueracrat.
Put little faith in anything the FBI does.
If you have people willing to go on a suicide mission
unmanned craft are not necessary.
Aerosol spray cans will do the trick nicely.
Very interesting. I've never heard this before.
What I recall people saying was that standard-size nozzles wouldn't work well for anthrax, that it would take unusual (custom-made) nozzles to distribute the particles of anthrax spores. However, buying or making one's own nozzles wouldn't really be a very formidable task. (We're talking here about somebody willing to make the necessary investment to attack the United States of America. The cost of a few custom-made nozzles is insignificant.)
But I read in an article a while back that papers were found in Kabul about converting a pesticide into a nerve gas with the addition of ingredients. I thought this might have been what they were thinking when they scoped out the crop-dusters.
That's interesting. In the discussion about the similarity between Gulf War syndrome and the symptoms the anthrax survivors are experiencing, I mentioned the possibility that a chemical agent caused both. (The chemical weapon would hypothetically have been mixed with some of the anthrax powder in the case of the anthrax mailings, and would also have been used in the Gulf War.) This is pure speculation, of course. [There's no evidence for it except the vague similarity of symptoms. Iraq has used chemical weapons in the past, and the Palestinians use rat poison in their bombs, so it would fit the pattern. As of now, it's just a possibility to be aware of.]
I agree with these general views. If you have to pick a single country, Iraq is the most likely. But we really don't have enough evidence to say.
I do think that the motive is more than revenge. The attack on the U.S. is intended to have a long-term effect; it's a calculated bid for world power status. (Whoever did it, the 9/11 attack and the anthrax mailings were two prongs of one coordinated action; the connections between the hijackers and the anthrax mailings imply that, as does the timing.)
If I had to guess right now, my bet would be on a loose consortium or alliance of countries. I don't think Pres. Bush spoke about an "Axis of Evil" as some kind of broad generality or sweeping metaphor. He really doesn't use a lot of figures of speech; he's a very down-to-earth kind of person. So, taking this speech at face value, I suspect that the U.S. government has evidence that there is alliance of countries against us in this war.
Pres. Bush specifically named Iraq, Iran, and North Korea. If North Korea is there, so is China, at least behind the scenes; North Korea can't sneeze without China's approval. (Another way to look at this is that naming North Korea was the U.S. government's diplomatic approach to including China in the list without spelling it out.)
I don't know exactly what this means -- not how Iraq and Iran are now allied, nor the nature of China's hypothetical involvement. And I could easily be wrong on the identities of the enemy countries. These are just suspicions right now; time will tell.
I don't think this is anything that should suprise you. Its like a maker of 'balloons of mass destruction' conducting exercises dropping them from tall buildings. Comon sense limits you to certain delivery systems.
Hunting for America's Leading Anthrax Hoaxer: Dr. Strangelove Strikes Again -- in Scotland!
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